Monday, October 19, 2009

Pastry for crispy thin waffles (recipe with pictures)

thin crispy waffles

Thin crispy waffles are very special topic for me. I like them so much, that I wanted to buy waffle maker all my life, but I didn't because I thought that this will bring me at least 5 kilos, as I will eat them from dust till dawn all the time. In reality even when I got my precious waffle maker it didn't happen like that because I am too lazy to make them so often. Another question was to find the right recipe and eventually I did. It took me about a year, but you've got an amazing opportunity to learn this recipe of crispy thin waffles right away! I suggest you to use it.

So, first of all you need a waffle maker (for making thin waffles - I don't know if recipe suits for thick ones).

Now we can talk about recipe of waffles itself

To get about 15-20 waffles you need

125 g of soft butter or margarine
130g of sugar
3 eggs
100 g of potato starch (makes them crispy)
100 g of flour
1/2 cup of milk
1/3 tea spoon of salt

Recipe is very easy, the most difficult thing you need to do is divide egg whites from the yolks and whip egg whites with half of sugar. Other sugar mix with yolks, butter, add salt and milk, when mixture is homogeneous - add potato starch and flour. Now you should add whipped egg whites and mix everything WITH A SPOON!
That's all, now butter the waffle maker while it's cold, warm it up for about 3-5 minutes and make waffles. Don't forget that you should put waffle pastry only on the central part of waffle maker! This thin waffles are amazing with whipped cream, caramel, melted chocolate or condensed milk and of course you can experiment with fillings.

p.s. Remember - if you want to give shape to your waffle, you can do it only right away, after just some seconds it will be an impossible thing to do.

Thursday, September 17, 2009

Shortcrust pastry (recipe with pictures)

The moment has come! Now is the turn of shortcrust pastry, which was the last one in my original list. Of course, it won't be the end of my pastry recipes, because those that I have already shown are basic ones and there are many other very interesting pastry recipes out there. Tradition of recipes with pictures will continue, as well as counting calories tradition.

And now a little about Shortcrust pastry. This kind of pastry is perfect for crunchy biscuits, sweet and savory pies, tarts. One of the main ingredients of shortcrust pastry is a butter or margarine,this is why is type of pastry is a not very light. Eggs, on the other hand, that often play an important role, fade into the background.

I made this pastry to make sweet biscuits called "Cigarettes"
Here they are

shortcrust pastryI made those when I was little with my father and that was very fun! So i think that children would find "making cigarettes" amusing.

To make about 750g of sweet shortcrust pastry (that is about 35 big tasty "cigarettes") you need

Sour cream 20.0% fat (50.0 grams) (there is no sour cream in original recipe, but I put little bit - it makes pastry little more soft and I like it more this way)
1 egg (60.0 grams) Flour (375.0 grams) Sugar (150.0 grams) Margarine, 60% th fat (125.0 grams) + 2 tea spoons of cinnamon + 1 tea spoon of baking powder
How to make

It is made very easily. Just mix all ingredients except flour with a spoon or mixer

shortcrust pastryThen put the flour by portions and mix the shortcrust pastry with hands. It looks like this when it's ready.

shortcrust pastryYou can make many tasty and beautiful things with this pastry, something like this

shortcrust pastry
If you want to make cigarette biscuits, divide the shortcrust pastry into pieces (number of pieces depends on the number of biscuits you want to get) . I got about 35 pieces.

shortcrust pastryRoll the cigarettes, put on the oven tray

shortcrust pastryAnd bake for about 15-20 minutes in oven. (180C)
If you don't want your shortcrust pastry to be sweet - don't put the sugar.

Wednesday, August 26, 2009

Counting calories - part II

Today I will continue counting calories of the pastry and dough recipes I gave. The topic will be puff pastry - how much calories each recipe contains (quick and long versions)

Puff pastry (quick version)

In recipe you take (about)

200g of butter or margarine
2 cups of flour
1/2 tea spoon of salt
1 tea spoon of sugar

And get 510 g of puff pastry, 100 of which contains

calories - 415,6
carbohydrates - 44 g
fats - 24 g
proteins - 6,7 g

Then goes puff pastry (long version)
In recipe you take (about)

1 egg
1 tea spoon of sugar
1 tea spoon of salt
1 big spoon of vinegar (7-9%)
1 big spoon of oil
about 200 ml of water
3.5 cups of flour (about 500g)
200 g of butter or unsweetened margarine

And get 918 g of puff pastry, 100 g of which contains

calories - 339.6
carbohydrates - 39.8 g
fats - 17.2 g
proteins - 7 g
So, if you have some time, there is a point to make a long version of puff pastry, it has more layers, rises better and has less calories and fat.

Tuesday, August 11, 2009

Choux pastry (recipe with pictures)

Yesterday I decided to make eclairs and for that I had to do choux pastry.

Pluses of choux pastry
1. It's volume increases during baking by 2-3 times, that means that you get PLENTY of eclairs or whatever you are making with this pastry.
2. It doesn't need any time to rest after preparing
3. It is ready within 15 minutes in oven

Minuses
1. Look up at plus number 1, since my recipe of this pastry is for about 50-60 eclairs I used oven 3 times, but result is totally worth it !

To make choux pastry you'll need

250 ml of water
100g of butter
pinch of salt
250 g of flour
4-6 eggs

How to make choux pastry

1. Sift a flour

sifted flour2.

Pour water in a pan, add butter, salt and boil everything until the butter melts

water and butter


When the butter has melted and mixture is boiling mix it with flour


flour and water with butter

choux pastry

Then put the pan with pastry back on the stove and mix everything until you get an even shiny pastry and some white sediment on the bottom of the pan

choux pastry

Then put the pastry in the clean bowl and mix 1 egg into it



choux pastry

When the pastry is mixed well you can add another egg. This way you add all the eggs, I used 4 big eggs, but if you see that it isn't enough, add 1 or 2 more. The pastry should look like this

choux pastry(you should be able to put the pastry in the cake decorator)
That is all! I used cake decorator to make stripes for eclairs, you can use it too or just a spoon, by the way many people say that choux pastry treats are more crunchy if you use spoon to put them on the baking tray.
And this is how I made eclairs

eclairs before baking

eclairs after bakingeclairs
eclairseclairs
For eclairs is usually used scalded cream, to make it you need

500 ml of milk
200 g of sugar
1 egg
1 table spoon of flour
1 table spoon of starch
100 g of soft unsweetened butter

How to make scalded cream

Put all ingredients except butter in the pot, mix with a mixer then put on the small heat and mix all the time. After few minutes you will see that consistence of the cream becomes thicker. Then you take it from the stove and let it cool down. When it is cold, mix a soft butter in it and put in the fridge for at least 20 minutes. I recommend to start making eclairs with cream, this way when it will be cooling down - you can make a pastry, so you will use your time wisely.

Saturday, August 8, 2009

Counting calories!

Today we' ll be counting calories, fats, carbohydrates, proteins in some of the pastry recipes I gave, because I know that every woman would like to know this.

So, let's start with unleavened dough

In recipe you take (about)
egg - 60g
flour - 400g
salt - 3g
oil - 30g
water - 170g

And get 663 g of dough, 100 of which contains

calories - 256
carbohydrates - 42 g
fats - 6 g
proteins - 8 g

Then goes yeast dough
In recipe you take (about)
2 eggs - 120g
milk - 500g
flour - 1000 g
sugar - 30g (not sweet dough)
butter - 50g
yeast - 50g

And get 1750 g of yeast dough, 100 g of which contains

calories - 254
carbohydrates - 44 g
fats - 5 g
proteins - 9 g

And if you make sweet yeast dough (add 250 g of sugar)
You get 2000 g of sweet yeast dough, 100 g of which contains

calories - 272
carbohydrates - 51 g
fats - 4 g
proteins - 8 g

That's it for today, later I'll count the calories in other dough types too.

Thursday, August 6, 2009

Puff pastry recipe with pictures (long version)

The recipe is not mine, I found it in internet, today tried to make it for a first time and IT IS AMAZINGLY GOOD! Of course making of this puff pastry takes a lot of time and effort, but firstly you get a fantastic result, secondly it is really cheap in comparison with the same thing in stores and finally you know what it contains and can be sure that it doesn't contain any unhealthy components, so

The recipe of puff pastry

You need
1 egg
1 tea spoon of sugar
1 tea spoon of salt
1 big spoon of vinegar (7-9%)
1 big spoon of oil
about 200 ml of water
3.5 cups of flour (about 500g)
200 g of butter or unsweetened margarine

How to make

1.Mix an egg, sugar, salt, vinegar and oil in a cup and add some water (about 200 ml) to make total volume 270 ml (mixture + water = 270 ml). If you do not have scales - just fill in the cup with water.

p.s. DO NOT USE HOT WATER!
Also watch the percentage of the vinegar (mine was 30% so I put some water in it and made 10% - took 1 big spoon of vinegar and 2 big spoons of water)


2. Add flour and make a pastry and let it rest for some time (15-20 minutes)


3. Divide the pastry into 4 parts


AND EACH PART
4. Roll into 30 cm* 55 cm piece

5. Cover it with 50 g of soft butter or margarine


6. Roll the pastry on a rolling-pin

7. Cut the pastry along the rolling-pin.

8. Take the pastry off the rolling-pin and fold in four

Finally, you will get 4 perfect pieces of puff pastry, each about 200-250g, altogether I got 920 g. Put those pieces of pastry in cellophane and put in a fridge for at least 4 hours, better to leave it there for a night. After that you can use it or freeze it.

I used only one part (240g) and made mini croissants with cheese


They were so good that disappeared in the mouth of my boyfriend in an hour (there were 12 pieces) and I received many compliments, so I strongly recommend this recipe!

Friday, July 31, 2009

Puff pastry recipe (quick version)

There are two main ways to make puff pastry - slow (right one) and quick one. Today I' ll give a recipe of a about quick one, because I have tried it recently and was satisfied by result.

Using it I made puff bows with sugar and cinnamon



To make this pastry (recipe)

You need

200g of butter or margarine
2 cups of flour
1/2 tea spoon of salt
1 tea spoon of sugar

How to make

Chop butter and flour together with a knife.


P.S. Do not make pastry even! Leave little butter pieces.

Add other ingredients, mix everything, put more flour if necessary. Cover the pastry and put in refrigerator for several hours (at least 1).

Then roll the pasty out and put together in layers. Do this operation 3-4 times and your quick puff pastry is ready!

Delicious things I' ve made using yeast dough

As I already said, when I conquered yeast dough, I started using it like crazy.

Here are some of my delicacies

Vatrushki (with cheese curd)


Rolls with sugar




Rolls with poppy-seeds

And so on...


Yeast dough (the best recipe ever)

This recipe is pure treasure. I have tried to make this dough for many years using internet and books, but the best result I got when used my mother's recipe. All this time it was so close! Now I make rolls and pasties all the time, plus - it is really cheap! (you get lots of it)

You need

2 eggs
500 ml of milk
50 g of yeast (not dry)
3 tea spoons of sugar (if you want to make sweet dough, add 250 g of sugar later)
50g of butter or margarine
about 1 kg of flour

How to make

Warm up milk to about 40C (1/2 cup), mix it with yeast and 3 spoons of sugar.




It will look like this





















After 5-10 minutes size of mixture will double























Warm up the rest of milk, put the mixture in cup in it, add 2 eggs, 50g of butter, more sugar if you make sweet dough and about 800g of flour. (dough has to be almost ready, but if it is not, never mind, it would be better sticky than put too much flour in it ).


































Cover the dough and let it rest for about 1,5 hour. During this time it will rise several times. Each time you need to press on it to make it's size smaller.
When time has passed, add some flour (about 200g) in order to get ready dough, which looks like this



Unleavened dough recipe

Unleavened dough is probably the simplest. It is used for flat cakes, dumplings (for example pelmeni) and so on.

To make unleavened dough
(recipe)

You need

2/3 cup of water
1/2 tea spoon of salt
3 cups of flour
2 big spoons of oil
1 egg


How to make

Mix all ingredients together and let it "rest" for 30-40 minutes.
I make this dough recipe mainly for pelmeni


The most important thing!



Can you imagine cosy home without a smell of home-made baking? I don't. And what is the most important thing you need to know to become a great baker? Right, it's a dough and pastry making !

So, first of all, dough and pastry types.

Unleavened dough
Yeast dough
Puff pastry
Choux pastry
Shortcrust pastry

Of course, there are more (including, for example, a pastry for a sponge cake which is used for many wonderful things - i couldn't find the it's name (help wanted!)), but for a start I'll share recipes of these, the most important ones. This recipes of pastry are proved and trustworthy so I hope that they will brings lots of joy for you and your close ones as they did for mine!